This Week = Fresno State

Fresno State should provide a bigger challenge than Arky State did, but this still wont be a big challenge. This is another game we should be able to control from start to finish and on both sides of the ball.   Many of the things I'm looking for this week are similar to last week.

If you didn't see the high points from last week, take 12 minutes and check out the new look.  Courtesy of MadMike over at Oregon Duck Soup.  http://winesfamily.blogspot.com/

#1 - I got to see Mario-TAH run the option a little.  We will get to see more of that but now I'm looking for a couple of good deep balls.   I LOVED what I saw last week out of the quick passing game, crossing routes and swing passes.   We stretch the ball sideline to sideline as good if not better than anyone in the country.   I'd still like to see more stretching of the field. 

#2 - Defensively I want a sack or two.   Arky State has a decent QB and a couple of WR's who are excellent athletes.   Their short passing attack kept us on our toes all day.  It was more so after we were up 50 points but if they can do it USC can do it, and better.   I'd like to see some growth out of the defense this week, specifically the D lines ability to not just pressure the QB, but to get to him, knock him down and sack him.   When we play USC our day will get better as Barkley's jersey gets dirtier.  

#3 - I am a Kenjon Barner fan, no doubt about it.  But I would like to see a nice long run.  But....9 carries for 66 yards...that's pretty solid right?   7.3 yards a carry?   Right?    Yes, that is very good and this may sound snobbish of me but we were playing Arky State.   This season I'm thinking in terms of what we can do against USC.  7.3 yards a carry may only be 3 yards vs USC.   I don't need 80 yards and a TD every time, but I'd like to see some big runs with solid yards after contact.  Three of Barner's carries were 11, 17 and 18.   He had a no gain, a 2 yarder and a couple of 4 yarders.   For comparrison's sake DAT had 3 carries for 64 yards. 

#4 - I want to see more of Byron Marshall.  He got 24 carries in mop up duty and had a couple of plays where I saw glimpses of flash.  He's a true freshman playing on a top 4 team.  Good start with a ton of improvement.  I think this week will provide a good look at his learning curve. 

#5 - Loved what I saw out of the WR's last week.   For this entire off season I've been saying "who will step up"?   Looks like maybe a couple guys did.  DAT is going to be coming out of the backfield in our Tazer position and he's just brilliant.  Lowe and Kelley had a few catches.  Huff, Hawkins and Vaughn, Stanford.  Mario-TAH chucked that ball to everyone on the team, Bennet kept it going.   While this is great, I'd like to see 1 guy become THE guy.  3rd down and we go to ______.   I'm talking about an all Pac-12 guy who gets wiffs of being a top round draft choice.  A go to guy.

#6 - I want to see Colt get the ball more.   I don't have any questions about him, just dayum, did you see him running over people and moving piles????    I want to see more of that because it is fun.

So, there is what I'll be looking for tonight when I watch the game on line because Direct TV and the Pac-12 haven't come to an agreement.   Jerks!

Week 1 - The Recap

Whew, what a great 1st 20 minutes. 7 drives, 7 TD's in an average of 1 minute 23 seconds. 50-3 when we started rotating in the 2nd string early in the 2nd Quarter. WOW! I certainly got some of the things I wanted and I'll have to wait a few more weeks to see some of the others.
Here's what I saw -
1 - I said I wanted to see a blow out. Just based purely on the score we did let Arky State come back into the game. But I was extremely happy with those 1st 20 minutes. The offense was working on all cylinders. I find it hard to believe that there was ever a battle between Mariota and Bennett. 2 of Bryan's 1st 4 passes were quite a bit off the mark, which may not be such a big deal in a 1st game of the season if it weren't for the fact that Marcus's passes were all about as perfect as you can throw.
2 - I wanted to see how Marcus ran the read option. I thought he did great. If you remove the sack from his stats he ran the ball 4 times for 33 yards. I was more impressed with a scramble where he directed Josh Huff and tossed the ball to him with defenders in his face. He looked like a man among boys. Very impressive performance.
3 - Colt did get into the action. He had a play where he grabbed a catch and it took virtually everyone on that defense to take him down. He's just a kid and as he gets better he could be huge. They are already talking about him being an NFL prospect in his 1st game as a true sophomore.
4 - I wanted to see a breakout WR. Obviously DAT will be a threat every time he touches the ball. And he will be playing some out of that TZR positions. Kind of funny to see the 2 deep chart and see him not listed as a starter. But you are not going keep that kid off the field. 7 touches last night ended in 3 td's. Outside of DAT I don't know that I got a breakout player. But Josh Huff looked great to me. Last year he wasn't himself fighting through injuries. I though Lowe and Kelley played well. Over the next few weeks we'll have to continue watching Addison who in my opinion looked primed to break 1 but just never did. I thought Dwayne Stanford looked good in mop up action.
And my #5 request - Wanted to see a complete shut down by our defense. I have some mixed feelings about this and I need to see more. Here are 2 things to keep in mind before I go into this.
1 - We were playing Arky State. 2 - Our offense plays so fast that our D has to defend more plays so stats can be a bit deceiving when talking D.
In the 1st half I certainly got a shut down, they looked great. The overall performance was fantastic. Here's where I get a little nervous.....
While the D line played very well I really wanted to see a few sacks, not that sacks are everything. It's just that USC's O-line will be MUCH better, we were supposed to see Jordan wrecking QB's. Side note - Alpin looked very good out there. Great job by him keeping his head up and making the offense work in the 2nd half. I was also a little concerned in the secondary. Alpin was able to dink and dunk all night, completing 29 passes for over 300 yards. I am reminded of the nightmare in Autzen last year when USC did the same thing. The difference is USC's WR's will be much better athletically than Arky State's.
WOW, what a 1st 20 minutes or so, just WOW. I may be nit picking the D here, that 1st half was impressive. The line got penetration so saying "no sacks" may be a bit much. But if Alpin and Arky State can execute a ton of 7 yard passes, so can USC. We should have a couple more blow outs, when we get into Pac play we should get some stiffer competition and have a better idea of where we are at.
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Week 1 - Oregon Ducks vs Arkansas State Red Wolves

The football season is FINALLY upon us. I'm sitting here on a Saturday morning in SEC country watching Georgia struggle a little with Buffalo. Before the game they talked about high expectations and winning the SEC's weaker division. Georgia is a team that in my opinion has been overrated the last 5 years or so. They seem to pop up in the Top 10 at the beginning of the year and they lose some games they shouldn't.
I start with that to say that the Ducks also have high expectations. As game day has drawn closer I've seen comments go from "Oregon should mop the floor with cupcake Arky St." to "This game will be closer than people think."
We have a young team and a few question marks. A QB that has never taken a snap and is just a Freshman. A WR corp that seems like it should have a breakout but hasn't. A TE phenom who seems to have some troubles. We don't know what, just that he's had some "things to take care of." A secondary who started as freshman and have a year under their belt now. Another pair of freshman (Arik Armstead, Byron Marshall) who could prove to be the future of the program on O and D.
3 straight Pac titles and 3 straight BCS bowl games place the Ducks in the top tier of college football. Being there is one thing, staying is another.
Here's what I want to see today.
1 - I do want to see a blow out. If we want to be an elite program we need to not slip up when playing these lower rated teams. I don't care if they have a few studs who may make some plays, but we should be able to handle this team.
2 - I want to see how Marcus runs the read option plays. The spring game was great, but we really didn't run our offense, plus it was touch football on the QB. I don't think Marcus needs to carry 25 times for 100 yards or anything. But I always felt like Darron should have kept the ball 4-6 more times than he did.
3 - I want to see Marcus throw to the TE's a bit. Lyerla, Brown, Koa - all young guys, I want to see what they are made of. A TE with great hands and no fear of a crossing route can make a young QB feel very comfortable.
4 - I want to see 1 of our WR's really step up and become a go to guy that people fear. As good as Jeff Maehl was and as much as we all loved him and his work ethic he was not a #1 draft pick that struck fear in the hearts of Defenses. That is what I want.
5 - This one is key. There has been a lot of talk about our defense. I want them to really shut down Arky ST. I don't want them to score in the 1st half of this game. If we rotate a bunch in the 4th QTR and they score some that is not a big deal. I want to see our D shut this team down, completely.
Not sure at this point whether this will go my way, we do have plenty of time with soft opponents and home games to get everything to gel. But we have some questions and I'm hoping they are answered quickly. I don't wan to waltz down to USC in November still wondering who will step up and WR and whether or not our TE position will be consistent.

My Prediction - Ducks 66 - Red Wolves - 13


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Let the Age of Marriota begin

After 8 months of waiting we have found out that Marcus Marriota will lead the team this year over Bryan Bennett. Based on comments players were making last year about Marcus when he was redshirting I was expecting this decision. Seemed like people were not saying the normal nice things you say about someone, everyone referred to him as special. His old high school coach in Hawaii said he expected big things. LMJ tweeted that Marcus may be the best passer Oregon's had.

All indications are that we have a lot to look forward to.

A word about Bennett - Bennett did a great job in the action he saw last year and could probably start anywhere, I have no doubt that we will learn very quickly that this decision has nothing to do with Bryan not being a highly capable leader. It is about a special young QB we have. Plus with our schedule this year I expect us to see plenty of Bryan and his abilities. Personally I like his style, he's a tough runner and I thoroughly enjoyed the AZ ST and CO games last year. I hope he sees enough action to keep him happy and with the Ducks. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to realize that there are several schools he could start at if he chose to go that route.

Everyone got real high on Marcus after the spring game where he looked fantastic. I don't put a whole lot in that game because it was touch football on the QB's and we weren't really running the read option plays. The long run he had was great but I don't think he would have got passed the safety had it been a live full action game.

Both guys seem to be an upgrade from Darron Thomas. And that should make us all happy!


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New 2009 Highlights

2009 has been a great year for the Ducks. Started out very low with our loss to Boise State. Clearly the new offensive line was not ready to go, we were lucky to gel by the 4th game. Blount's punc heard round the NCAA was awful, a low point for the year. I did ot want to see him return to the team. I'm glad Chip Kelly allowed him to continue working toward his degree, hopefully he learns from his mistakes.

The Purdue and Utah wins were heart wrenching, really should not have won either of those games.

A good run in the middle of the season with huge wins over top 10 CAL and USC. We destroyed both our foes in spectacular fashion! The Halloween crushing of the Trojans was great to watch.

Unfotunately the season high was followed by another low, the loss at Stanford. Toby ran wild and our defense did not show up. I don't know if we just overlooked them or had a hangover from the previous week, it was ugly.

Then ended the regular season strong. A big win over our rivals...The Beavers!


Over in the video bar is a nice 3 part video recapping the seasons highs and lows.

Pac-10 VS SEC 2009 - Defensive Comparison

Of course I live here in SEC country and all I ever hear about is how much better the SEC is. "Pac-10 doesnt know how to play defense", not a day goes by I don't here that. I decided to do some break downs and comparisons on this years match ups.

Those who know me know tat my point is not that the Pac-10 is better or would cream anyone in every game, but neither is the SEC. The defenses in the Pac-10 give up a lot of points because the offenses are so good, not because of bad defense.

I looked at 3 Pac-10 vs SEC Match ups.....

UCLA over Tenn 19-15 in Tenn
LSU over Wash 31-23 in Washington
Georgia over Arizona State 20-17 at Georgia

So 2-1 SEC VS Pac-10.

The Pac-10 teams that played were the #7, #8 and #9 teams of the conference.
The SEC teams that played were the #2 and #3 of the West and #2 of the East.

So 3 bottom tier Pac-10 played 3 games, 2 games on the road, against 3 top tier SEC teams and came out 1-2.


Let's look at the defenses, to compare I'm looking at the Pac-10 defensive performance vs the top 3 SEC defenses against the same teams.

The University of Tennessee's offense..........

VS.................UCLA........Alabama....Florida....LSU
Points.............15..........12.........13.........didn't play
Total Yards........208.........341........210
Passing............93..........265........93
Rushing............115.........76.........117

Keep in mind this is the #9 team in the Pac-10 compared to the #1 and #2 SEC teams.

UCLA held TN to less yards than AL and FL. While both SEC teams held TN to fewer poins. UCLA's defense performed nearly equal in every category as Florida. Bama's rush defense held better but gave up more than double the passing yards.


LSU's offense........................

VS.................WASH........Alabama....Florida
Points.............31..........15.........3
Total Yards........321.........253........162
Passing............172.........158........66
Rushing............149.........95.........96

Keep in mind this is the #7 team in the Pac-10 compared to the #1 and #2 SEC teams.

Both Bama and FL held LSU a lot better in the scoring department. LSU was able to gain 50 more yards on the ground agaist Washington.


Georgia's offense........................

VS.................AZ ST.......Alabama....Florida...LSU
Points.............20..........DNP........17........13
Total Yards........334....................286.......274
Passing............242....................164.......229
Rushing............92.....................210.......49

This is the #9 team in the Pac 10 playing on the road.

Again we see a better scoring defense out of the SEC schools.

I do see here that the numbers show a better defense in the SEC. But not by much. Considering that some of the top teams in the SEC played some of the worse teams in the Pac-10 makes these numbers look even closer.

The lack of respect for Oregon

It's always been out there but it is just ridiculous. Pac-10 is coming off a year where they won all their bowl games. The Big-10 went 1-6 last year. So lets examine this weeks big games in each conference.

#5 Ranked Penn State vs Unranked (29th in votes) Iowa

#6 Ranked CAL vs Unranked (30th in votes) Oregon

Looks like an exrtemely comparable match up.

Iowa beats Penn State 21-10 on the road.

Oregon beats CAL 42-3 at home.

So, give a kudos to Iowa for going on the road and playing a great game. Kudos to Oregon for a blowout. I may be a tad biased but I think a 39 point win should count a little more than a 10 point road win. Not by much, but a little.

Lets break down Iowa's and Oregon's other games.

IOWA is 4-0 WINS over #5 Penn State, Arizona, Iowa State and Northern Iowa.

OREGON is 3-1 WINS over #6 CAL, #19 Utah and Purdue, LOSS to #14 Boise State.

Iowa slid up the polls 16 spots while Oregon slid up 14. In the USA today poll Iowa is #17 while Oregon is #25. Wait, 25??? 2 wins over top 25 teams and we are #25?


Now lets take a look at the Top 4 teams. Currently Oregon has played more ranked teams than the top 4 teams combined.

#1 Florida is slated at this time to face 2 top 25 teams. They will undoubtedly face a top 25 in the SEC championship game bringing their total to 3. Florida's strength of schedule this year is somewhere in the 100's. Meaning it is literally one of the weakest in the country. Actually I think it is only slightly stronger than Boise State. FL International, Charleston Southern and Troy, OH MY!

Oregon has faced 3 top 25 teams in 4 weeks. Couple more to come.

#2 Texas has played Wyoming, UTEP, Texas Tech and Louisiana Monroe. They will be faing 3top 2 teams plus the Big 12 championship game.

#3 Alabama gets a kudos for opening with VA Tech, but they also have FL Inernaional, North Texas and Chatanooga on thier schedule.

#4 LSU will actually face 4 top 25 teams, if they make it to the SEC championship game it will be 5. I've watched some LSU games and I think they will not make it past all the ranked SEC teams without loosing 1 or 2. But if they do they will earn it!



If you take a look at VA Tech you will see they are now ranked #6 in the country.

They lost to Alabama and came back to have quality wins over Marshall, #18 Nebraska and #9 Miami. Thier year has been similar to the Ducks.

I've watched each of the Duck games this year. The team is playing very good ball rigt now, the O line was a HUGE question mark coming in this year and it showed against Boise State.


The moral of the story is that you should NOT give the fans what they want. Don't schedule tough games! The Ducks should have played Troy, Charleston Southern, Florida International, Chatanooga, North Texas or Louisiana Monroe. They'd be 4-0 and ranked 5th or 6th right now. Of course if Oregon played any of those teams they would have a "weak strength of schedule because they are not in the SEC."